Szent István napja

First, a history lesson:

August 20th is a really big day here in Hungary, it is called Szent István napja! In the year 1000, Hungary's first king, the Christian St. Stephen, was crowned on August 20th and the Hungarian state was founded. A case containing the right hand of St. Stephen is carried in a procession from the Basilica through the streets of Budapest. In 1949, Hungary accepted it's constitution. They have parades, music, and fireworks at night over the Danuve River to celebrate. We didn't get to see any of the other festivities but lucky for us, we live right by the Danube river and walked by and saw the amazing fireworks, some of the best I have ever seen!

In other news, we have 3 companionships in Kispest now! I forgot to mention this last week. We have 4 Elders now and also myself and Willets Nővér. Also, I think I forgot to talk about this as well, but we went to a little "young women's camp" last week for the girls in our ward. It was in a place called Nagykovácsi which is a small town close to Budapest where one of the members live. It is a really small and cute town! The girls were so excited that we were able to come and spend a little bit of time with them. We went out with them and talked to people about The Book of Mormon and they loved it. At the end of the day we had given out 17 Books of Mormon! One other thing to note from our trip to Nagykovácsi is that I totally got flashed by a néni -- yikes.

Willets Nővér and I made some great goals for the upcoming transfer to really focus on missionary work in the belváros (the center of the city, on the Pest side where we work). I am really happy to continue working with her. We also had a mission leadership meeting last week which was great, the missionary work is really picking up and we talked about some great ideas. Our Mission President talked about how there are huge blessings waiting for us as we diligently serve our missions and love the people of Hungary. 

Something funny from this past week happened on the metro. Willet Nővér and I were headed home and we ran into the metro station just in time to jump onto the last car of the metro. After the doors closed, we looked into one of the other cars and realized there weren't nearly as many people and there were places to sit. So at the next stop we got out of the car we were in and hurried to the next, almost missing it before the doors closed. I don't know how to describe these doors closing but let's just say they will chop your hand off if you aren't careful. Maybe look up the number 3 metro on Youtube if you're a visual person; anyways, we called it the Hungarian fire drill. 

We were able to meet with Csilla again this week and we had a great lesson. We talked about the parable of the lost sheep (Luke 15:2-7) and about how Christ will always lovingly welcome us back and wants more than anything that we are in His fold. A scripture in the Book of Mormon that I really love about this is Alma 5:60, which says:

"And now I say unto you that the good shepherd doth call after you; and if you will hearken unto his voice he will bring you into his fold, and ye are his sheep; and he commandeth you that ye suffer no ravenous wolf to enter among you, that ye may not be destroyed."

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Also, I don't remember if I mentioned this, but Krisztián has been having some serious health problems lately. He is amazingly doing much better now and he is one of the most inspirational examples to me. He has such a positive attitude and has complete trust in the Lord that whatever needs to happen concerning his health, will be what is right for him and what needs to happen because God has a specific plan for each of us. He is so excited to start helping out the missionaries more with lessons and he told myself and Willets Nővér that we make a great team together. Last week, he asked us if he could teach us about charity and some things he learned while he was in the hospital. He has really strengthened my testimony and I am so glad I am able to learn from him. He talked about how much love our Heavenly Father and Christ have for us​ and that charity is truly the pure love of Christ. He talked about how we need love ourselves so that we are able to love others. I thought that was a really interesting thought. 

​Have a great week!​

Sok szeretettel, Schoendorfer Nővér

A part of our new District.

Holocaust Museum.

A beautiful Synagogue near the Museum.

Just one of the numerous perks of having to walk by the Danube River to get home to your apartment at night is being able to watch the fireworks.